Is it almost impossible to find a comfortable position for sleeping? Trust me when I tell you that I know just how you feel. 6 months ago, that was exactly what my life was like. This is my uncensored, rotator cuff story. The ups, the downs, what didn't work (and cost lots of money) and finally the one thing that did help me achieve my goal of ending my rotator cuff pain by strengthening my shoulder muscles with rotator cuff exercises.
My rotator cuff pain started in early May. I lifted a box of dishes off a top shelf in the kitchen and I felt a sharp twinge in my left shoulder. We were getting ready for my youngest son's graduation open house and I didn't have any time to slow down. I ignored the pain. Afterall, I had walls to paint, upholstery to scrub, a basement to organize and a garage to clean. I foolishly thought that the pain was going to go away on its own and I just needed to 'tough it out'. Finally, by the middle of June, I couldn't ignore the pain any longer. It hurt to do everything! Just putting on my seat belt was agony, lifting a bag of groceries was torture.
I made an appointment with my chiropractor and he tried massage, the next week he tried ultrasound and finally acupuncture. Nothing helped. I visited my local sports medicine clinic. They did shoulder x-rays, told me I had a rotator cuff injury and assured me that all I needed was a cortisone injection. The injection helped for 2 weeks and then the pain came back worse than ever. I was beginning to lose hope. I was depressed and felt like my life was on hold.
I would wake up every night trying in vain to find a comfortable way to sleep. Often I would end up sleeping in the recliner in the living room. I spent $2,198 on muscle therapy, acupuncture and cortisone injections. Nothing worked.
Then one night when I couldn't sleep, I stumbled across the solution on the internet. I found a step by step system to overcome my shoulder pain. I watched the videos to follow along and began doing exercises for rotator cuff.
The videos said to start slowly and to warm up the shoulder with a heating pad before starting with the stretching exercises. It helped me to think of my rotator cuff like a stiff piece of taffy. At first it's rock hard and really hard to chew but as it gets warm, it's softens up and it's very pliable. And when your rotater cuff is soft and pliable, it's much easier and less painful to stretch.
I don't know about you, but I always thought that 'Pain = Gain'. Now I learned that isn't true. The plan I followed had me increasing each of the stretches by only 1 additional repetition a day. At first I thought, "this is going to take forever" - I'm not a very patient person, by nature. But I decided to put my faith in what the program said and not try to rush it along.
And day by day my shoulder started to feel better. I was almost afraid to believe it, after all the agony I'd been through. Now, I have to tell you - the pain didn't go away overnight. I don't want to kid you about that. But finally I had some hope. And the constant pain started to fade away. Day by day. Every day I could feel the cuff exercises strengthening my shoulder muscles. And now, I have no more pain. I have my life back!
You can find the program I used here Cuff Exercises and I'll share with you more tips on how to cure shoulder pain at www.CuffExercises.com that you can read on my website from the comfort of your home at 2:00 am in your pajamas!
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